As has become the norm at such international gatherings in recent years, the eccentric climate sceptic Lord Monckton has flown in to Rio to perform his party piece about how environmentalists are trying to establish a “world socialist government”, and such like. What is less clear these days is whether his colleagues at the UK Independence Party (Ukip) approve of such interventions.

Under Lord Pearson, the previous Ukip leader, Monckton was the party's deputy leader and was also variously the head of the party's policy unit, as well as its spokesman on energy and the environment. But ever since fellow eccentric climate sceptic Roger Helmer defected from the Conservatives to Ukip earlier this year, he has assumed the latter role. So what, if any, role does Monckton now have at Ukip?

Gawain Towler, Ukip's press spokesman, has confirmed to me this morning that Monckton “no longer has any formal role” with Ukip. Towler described Monckton as an “outlier” who is now “semi-detached” from the party, partly because he's “barely in the country these days”. (Before arriving in Rio, Monckton had been touring the US Tea Party circuit casting doubt on the origins of Barack Obama's birth certificate.) [See DeSmog's coverage of Monckton's birther tour]

I asked if there had been a falling out between Monckton and the current Ukip leader, Nigel Farage. Towler said not, but said that Monckton - whom he described as a “17th century pamphleteer” - was sometimes the source of “frustration” and was “very much Lord Pearson's man - they own contiguous shooting estates in Scotland”. Towler added that Monckton had been active in the party at a time when it was “not drowning in talent”, but the recent surge in popularity for the party had seen a fresh influx of personnel. Monckton was a “loose cannon”, said Towler, but Helmer is a “tied-down cannon, pointed in the same direction”.

Comments

This book should be required reading for all those who contribute to Desmog.

Merchants of Despair: Radical Environmentalists, Criminal Pseudo-Scientists, and the Fatal Cult of Antihumanism

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1594034761/manhattaninstitu/

“There was a time when humanity looked in the mirror and saw something precious, worth protecting and fighting for—indeed, worth liberating. But now, we are beset on all sides by propaganda promoting a radically different viewpoint. According to this idea, human beings are a cancer upon the Earth, a horde of vermin whose aspirations and appetites are endangering the natural order. This is the core of antihumanism.

Merchants of Despair traces the pedigree of this ideology and exposes its pernicious consequences in startling and horrifying detail. The book names the chief prophets and promoters of antihumanism over the last two centuries, from Thomas Malthus through Paul Ehrlich and Al Gore. It exposes the worst crimes perpetrated by the antihumanist movement, including eugenics campaigns in the United States and genocidal anti-development and population-control programs around the world.

Combining riveting tales from history with powerful policy arguments, Merchants of Despair provides scientific refutations to all of antihumanism’s major pseudo-scientific claims, including its modern tirades against nuclear power, pesticides, population growth, biotech foods, resource depletion, and industrial development.”

I’m not sure why this book should be on anyone’s required reading list, when the premise it appears to be built on is so far removed from reality: “we are beset on all sides by propaganda promoting a radically different viewpoint. According to this idea, human beings are a cancer upon the Earth, a horde of vermin…etc” This is straw man stuff of the sillier kind.

A casual glance at most campaigns to protect the environment, whether in defence of National Parks, clean water, pollution control or climate stability, emphasize the benefits to human beings first and foremost. In any case, the idea that protecting the natural balances in the world - the heat content of the climate system being perhaps the most important - is somehow at odds with the interests of humanity is redundant and outdated. There is nothing better calculated to undermine human prosperity and human numbers than environmental degradation and destruction. The natural world is our world. If make it uninhabitable we have nowhere else to go.

Hank_ as usual continues to spread his despicable attacks on the so called left wing activists.

In particular he mentions attempts at population control. Well the only identified population control was conducted in Central America. It was not supported or carried out by “left wing activists” but by the stalwarts of the right wing industrial nasties of the USA.

“In the 1990’s the UN’s World Health Organization launched a campaign to vaccinate millions of women in Nicaragua, Mexico and the Philippines between the ages of 15 and 45, allegedly against Tetanus, a sickness arising from such things as stepping on a rusty nail. The vaccine was not given to men or boys, despite the fact they are presumably equally liable to step on rusty nails as women.

Because of that curious anomaly, Comite Pro Vida de Mexico, a Roman Catholic lay organization became suspicious and had vaccine samples tested. The tests revealed that the Tetanus vaccine being spread by the WHO only to women of child-bearing age contained human Chorionic Gonadotrophin or hCG, a natural hormone which when combined with a tetanus toxoid carrier stimulated antibodies rendering a woman incapable of maintaining a pregnancy. None of the women vaccinated were told.

It later came out that the Rockefeller Foundation along with the Rockefeller’s Population Council, the World Bank (home to CGIAR), and the United States’ National Institutes of Health had been involved in a 20-year-long project begun in 1972 to develop the concealed abortion vaccine with a tetanus carrier for WHO. In addition, the Government of Norway, the host to the Svalbard Doomsday Seed Vault, donated $41 million to develop the special abortive Tetanus vaccine”.

This seems to be the new tool of delay that deniers are starting to employ in their selection of tin foil hats. Lomborg and other deniers seem to think it’s worth pursuing, as I’ve seen more and more deniers clinging to this as their new life raft.

It’s another one of those red herrings that are easily absorbed by those unwilling to read, research or employ logical thinking.

Hank, I am seeing across the blogosphere an increasing tendency for deniers to distance themselves from Monckton. I noticed you completely dodged talking about Monckton and instead, chose to talk about some other nutter work of fiction.

Monckton now seems to be firmly planted in with the conspiracy crowd and deniers are starting to see their association with him means they are also perceived as wild eyed,lip quivering conspiracy theorists…..which they are anyway. But holding Monckton up to be some sort of hero of the denier religious movement, used to be a badge of honour. He now seems to be moving away from his traditional fan base (moderate conservatives to right wingers) into the arms of even less realistic people like the TEA party.

Deary me, you appear to be attacking the poor man rather than address his concerns with your conjecture. That’s how science works by the way.

Anyway, Greetings from England, a very cold and extremely wet England that is not playing ball with the environmental Agency that say we are in drought. How so, we have had non-stop torrential rain since early April, our reservoirs are full and our rivers are taking up residence in 1000’s of peoples front rooms? But the ‘aquifers are depleted’ apparently, the sort of rain we are getting is not the right sort of rain to solve the problem. Shame it does seem to be the right sort of water that drowns people. Do trees still drink a months rain in one day, which has been a regular occurrence in the last three months.

I’m afraid anything but doomsday scenarios don’t sell newspapers and as soon as the media are fed a line they feed it with interest to the fodder hungry populace. I never had time for Mr B Man under the bed.

There is much to be said in favour of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. (Oscar Wilde - The Critic as Artist)

It shocks me that the masses are being so easily herded in order to oppress opposition to politically convenient ‘science’. I don’t know, if someone were honest and suggested that our reliance on fossil fuel could not continue without some checks then sure I would not mind investing some extra tax on finding real alternatives. Alternatives that are driven by real science not a parasitic industry grazing on the massive handouts in the name of self-flagellation.

The internet and the socialist ideal of making everyone as educated as each other, when we know this is just not possible, is the route cause of the oppression. Once billions of people who would not ordinarily be safe to be let out alone have an anonymous opinion then they can be counted in the herds. The thinking populace are about 5% and this is the clever trick of the socialist, science is no longer about fact it’s about numbers and 5% is not large enough to overcome the dumb society we have created for ourselves.

A world order that dictates we spend £billions of dollars making no difference at all when we know that sort of money could resolve a number of real issues massively. Issues that kill hundreds of thousands of people. Yes, climate change kills people, kills them by starving the oxygen (funding) that could quite easily save huge numbers, numbers we could not comprehend if it happened on our back doorstep. How crass that we use the demise of millions of people to probably make their plight a whole lot worse. Lining the pockets of their despot rulers is the self-flagellation, we sleep well at night because of it.

People need to be shown that they should get informed or shut up, they are simply noise in the system.

“The internet and the socialist ideal of making everyone as educated as each other, when we know this is just not possible, is the route cause of the oppression. Once billions of people who would not ordinarily be safe to be let out alone have an anonymous opinion then they can be counted in the herds. The thinking populace are about 5% and this is the clever trick of the socialist, science is no longer about fact it’s about numbers and 5% is not large enough to overcome the dumb society we have created for ourselves.”

Started your own TEA party over there yet Dave? You have allthe hallmarks and ramblings of those nutters.

“A world order that dictates”

Not another nutter that reads Info Wars and David Icke.

“that sort of money could resolve a number of real issues massively”

Like what? We could also just have a lot more regulation to stop money hemorrhaging out of the system like the GFC caused couldn’t we? We could also not spend billions on our military either, that causes more problems than it resolves.

I’m an engineer. I deal in point form facts, figures and science. I like my information lined out that way.

When someone’s waffling, they have nothing useful to say.

Let me get the ball rolling for you Lara. Its not on topic but concise and to the point.

Oil and Gas gets absolutely castigated when some birds die. Its front page news and they get fined up the wazoo.

So, when in comes to wind energy, why the free ride? Why aren’t wind farms being required to set up boom cannons to keep the birds away?

To me, it does sound like wind is getting a free ride. On one hand, I haven’t seen a comparative analysis. On the other I’m also reasonably certain that oil and gas kills significantly more birds. Certainly there seems to be something perhaps worth talking about?

So you see Lara, there is plenty of real things to discuss out there. You guys never seem to bring it to the table. I kinda miss the days when you’d bring fake science papers to the forums. That was easy and fun to go through.

Hey Lara, you know with all that fracking stuff that we have chemical reporting in BC, Alberta, and Saskatchewan? So why is everyone so upset?

As for Mr Shaw… he waffling along. I’m not sure what about. A long paragraph about rain. Hmm… Global Warming does cause increased hydrological cycles. Perhaps he’s enjoying one of the wet ones. But its very important. He dedicated a whole paragraph to it.

Doomsday and newspapers.. What’s that there for?

Delivering the opinions of the uneducated… I assume that’s a jab at Monckton?

Some industry is now a parasite? What’s that paragraph about? What industry is he speaking of? Oil and Gas? Canada is opposed to ending its subsidies. We subsidize every bit of oil we use.

To be blunt… I think this David Shaw could be smart but I have no idea what he steeped in before he showed up. Links do help in this endeavor. I do really try to figure out where people are coming from. He’s just waffling with a not so subtle level of condescension.

In the mean time Lara, I’m sure you will continue to lurk and contribute nothing of value.

"Fossil-fuel companies have spent millions funding anti-global-warming think tanks, purposely creating a climate of doubt around the science. DeSmogBlog is the antidote to that obfuscation." ~ BRYAN WALSH, TIME MAGAZINE